Allergic diseases and early childhood insomnia: A cross-sectional study

Early Childhood Insomnia (ECI) and allergic diseases may coexist, however, the specific breakdown of allergy subtypes among children with ECI remains unclear. This study aimed to evaluate allergic diseases in children with ECI and compare sleep characteristics according to ECI, and allergic disease status.

This cross-sectional study recruited 300 children aged 6-36 months from pediatric sleep, allergy, and well-child outpatient clinics. Age-adjusted generalized linear models were used to analyze continuous sleep parameters derived from Brief Infant Sleep Questionnaire. Additional models included ECI status, allergic disease status, and an ECI×allergic disease interaction, generating four combinations: healthy (n = 65), allergic disease only(n = 52), ECI only (n = 110), and ECI with allergic disease (n = 73). Threshold-defined sleep outcomes were examined using binary logistic regression.

Among children recruited from sleep clinic, 25% had at least one allergic disease. In the four-group analyses, ECI-only and ECI-plus-allergy groups had more night wakings, longer nocturnal wakefulness, and shorter uninterrupted sleep than the healthy and allergy-only groups, whereas the healthy and allergy-only groups didn't differ significantly. No ECI×allergic disease interaction was found for continuous sleep outcomes. For waking >3 times per night, a borderline negative interaction was observed (OR, 0.18; 95% CI, 0.03-1.00; p = 0.049), indicating that the combined association was weaker than expected from the separate associations.

ECI and allergic diseases frequently overlapped; however, the most pronounced sleep disturbances were primarily associated with ECI status whereas allergic conditions primarily associated with sleep fragmentation. Co-occurring allergic disease did not consistently intensify the sleep disturbances associated with ECI.